A Night's Embrace
by Zurui Karasu
Summary: A young Mazoku wanders the temple of sand alone, lusting for power, until she happens upon Maryuou Gaav himself. They have a little chat, and he reveals that she may have been living a lie and that the soul he lost may have been much more than a servant.


A Night's Embrace

Author's Note: My very first completed Gaav/Val fic!  I really encourage you to read it, even if you don't like the Gaav and Val pairing, give them a chance!  You may find you like it.  *Grin*  The title is also sort of a play on words, knight and night, so think of it as such while reading the fic!  I didn't give it this title for no reason!  ^_^  So sit back and enjoy!  And reviews are always appreciated!  *Wink wink nudge nudge*

Disclaimer: The characters of Gaav and Val, quite tragically do not belong to me!  Also, author may not be held accountable for any emotions released during the reading of this fan fic, or any trauma that may occur as a result thereof.  Use at your own risk.

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A Night's Embrace

The sun blazed like a disk of golden fire as it wheeled in the pale flaxen sky above the vast rolling hills of sand, dotted with lines of stone tablets and streaked in their long grotesquely stretched shadows and glimmering under the heat.  One lone, dark figure dared to tread the blistering terrain of the Temple of Sand, determined scowl set into her malevolently curled maw revealing a set of wicked fangs, sun glinting off her silvery gray blue hair, choppy bangs matted to her forehead with sweat, and a long black cape billowed behind her as she stalked through the mocking and looming monoliths covered in markings that her furious intellect could make no sense of.  Her tall pointed ears drooped, almost with the weight of the many silver hoops and cuffs around them after the nearly unbearable heat, and her sharp, icy gray cat-like eyes smoldered with a fire equal to the fiery celestial ornament hung low above her as she paused at a page of the Claire Bible, thinking a few of the strange emblems in the dark rock were familiar, but snarled to herself and trudged on as they faded back into the analogous script.  

The Temple of Sand had grown quiet since the infamous exploits of a demonic young sorceress named Lina Inverse, or so the creature had been told, and the guide who had resided there since antiquity had been destroyed, leaving no one with the knowledge of where information was located.  The original Claire Bible had also been sealed away as well, rumors that the demon dragon king Gaav himself had infiltrated it and after the slaughter of the golden dragons that had soon ensued, the blacks, cousins slain in battle, in their grief and anger had closed the entrance to even themselves.  The Mazoku woman had spent countless years of her still short life searching, combing the world and its countries and people for a spell of power that would bring her the vengeance and domination she had yearned for since her creation, and her travels had brought her finally to the sweltering desert palace that held the knowledge of the world.

Gripping the silver, purple jeweled hilt of the sword at her hip with one hand, the young Mazoku paused only a moment to wipe the perspiration from her brow with the other, and squint into the crimson light of the temple.  

"I know I haven't been this way before…" she hissed virulently to no one, "But everything in this damn place looks the same!  I can't even read these stupid tablets!  I swear to Lord Shabranigdo I'm going to kill that idiot who told me about this!"  

She clenched a fist sincerely at her side and executed a swift and agitated teleport to the nearest stone tablet, banging a fist against the searing hot slab of rock as she rematerialized in front of it.  

"Why can't I read this stupid writing?!" the woman seethed, running a finger down the rectangular markings and scanning them with a scrutinizing eye.  Only when she was able to discern a few rather insignificant and small words did she release the frustrated howl that had been mounting within her chest as loud and shrilly as her body would allow and kicked the monolith savagely with all her might, standing perfectly still afterward as she fumed.

She stood in a stoic stupor until the sky faded to an inky blue, and the horizon illuminated a bloody crimson and orange, splattering into the sparse clouds that hung low over the dunes.  The shadows of the Claire bible manuscript had grown, and melded with one another into a net of blackness across cerulean sands, enveloping the unfeeling young Mazoku in their shade and coolness.  She felt only the mocking energy signals from the ancient text, eyes glaring and sparking angrily as she watched them, felt them, and still knew nothing, her mind fading into night's embrace as the sun sank lower, but as it dulled and soothed itself after the heat of the day, a fiery sensation of a strange presence from beside her started the young woman out of her reverie.

She glanced sharply over her right shoulder, narrowing her eyes virulently and placing a hand on the blade strapped at her hip apprehensively, baring her fangs and shaking her head to clear the slight airy feeling of her absorption into the ancient writings.  

"Who's there?" she growled lowly, drawing the sword and brandishing it menacingly in front of her, "I can sense you!  There's no use hiding from such a powerful Mazoku like me!"  

The silvery-haired woman sneered viciously into the darkened temple, and took a few cautious steps backward, listening carefully for any sound other than the crunch of grains under her boot heels, but none issued forth from the quiescent shrine to ancient knowledge, and she lowered her weapon, eyes still darting about confusedly. Exhaling the breath she had been holding for what seemed like an eternity the Mazoku smirked mockingly at herself, punched her temple lightly in punishment for being foolish and skittish and raising the sword to sheath it, but the blade halted in midair as a flash of red caught the woman's eye.

A dark, looming shadow wreathed in flame moved from behind the stone tablet in front of her, dark eyes the color of midnight and long, flowing crimson locks spilling across the black form of a man that glared once in her direction, and moved on.  

"Excuse me," it whispered in a gruff and mocking, deeply masculine tone, "I wasn't aware anyone else was using this section of the manuscript."  The woman backed quickly away, her spine colliding with the cold slab of masonry behind her as she pointed her weapon fearfully in the general direction of the swift specter that moved soundlessly past the shadows of the slab and into the light.  

"Who are you?!" she demanded in a shakier voice than she would have liked, the sword glinting in the light from the deft movements it amplified of the trembling in her arms.

The man glanced at her and raised an eyebrow with a mournful smirk, shaking his head and running a hand through his impossibly long tresses as he scanned quickly over her manuscript, moving fully into what little silver moonlight there was revealing his garb of a deep tan trench coat with a high collar and an imposing looking sword strapped tightly to his back.  

"It doesn't matter really," he answered casually at length, "This isn't what I was looking for, and I doubt it's what you want either."  Lowering her blade slightly, the silver-eyed Mazoku sneered at the strange man who smiled smugly at her, the familiar, if not weak, stench of a fellow creature of darkness finally penetrating her senses as she laughed condescendingly.  

"Hah, funny…  And how do you know what I'm looking for?  And you're telling me you can read this gibberish?" she scoffed condescendingly, "A weak pathetic specimen of the Mazoku race like you?"  The flame-haired man only grinned wider and shrugged as he made a move to pass wordlessly by, until the flash of the blade as it rocketed in front of him flared in the blue light of night, reflecting into the woman's incensed crystalline irises sharply.  

"Yes, I can read it, and unless the world's best method for getting teriyaki sauce out of your tunic is what you were looking for, you'd best move on," he answered finally in a complacently bright voice.

The Mazoku lowered her blade with a loud snarl and snatched the strange man's arm in her palm tightly, digging her long, hooked talon-like nails into his flesh savagely as she hissed in a virulent voice.  

"Well, even if this isn't what I want, if you can read it then I'm afraid I simply can't let you go," she sibilated cruelly, gaining only a self-satisfied laugh from her captive.  

"I wouldn't do that, if I were you…" he warned gently, "Now if you'll kindly excuse me, I have a lot of manuscript left to search."  The woman only tightened her grip, grinning puckishly as the other Mazoku winced slightly in pain and shot her a foul look as she echoed his previous laughter viciously.  

"Oh no you don't, I'd really hate to have to kill you, after making such a find, but you are most definitely coming with me," she replied acerbically, lowering her eyes.  Her companion merely sighed deeply and rolled his eyes, pulling his arm swiftly free from the vise-like grip and crossing it across his chest angrily with the other, glaring murderously as his eyes met with the younger woman's.  

"You just don't get it do you?  You couldn't possibly kill me even if you wanted to!" he laughed spitefully, the fury rising from the woman before him almost pleasing as she clenched her fists by her sides.  

"Oh I'm sure, you couldn't even sense me!" she quipped back haughtily.  "I felt you come in here you idiot, I've known where you were since the moment you came in, and if I had so desired, could have dispatched you easily!  You're damn lucky I don't make_ you show some respect! But I've wasted enough time on you, and will take my leave, if you don't mind!" the red-haired figure snapped shortly and whirled on his heels to go._

A burst of fiery energy consumed the younger woman, and her eyes widened as they met with that of a dark lord's, his full energy finally obvious to her as he stopped concealing it from her, smug grin still plastered to his lips and watching her eyes widen with terror.  

"Y-You're a… Wait!  W-Who are you really?" she breathed fearfully.  

"Me?" the red-head asked mockingly, pointing to his chest and stopping to look at her once more over his shoulder with a wide Cheshire grin, "Why, Demon Dragon King Gaav himself my lady!  And who might you be?"  The Mazoku opened her mouth to speak as she found herself unable to tear her eyes away from Gaav's pained, yet still derisive midnight blue irises as they burned powerfully into the back of her mind, and only after struggling for breath and backing away even further did she find her voice.  

"N-Niven…" she answered instinctively, "Niven Thanitris…"

Gaav straightened himself haughtily, and nodded once in Niven's direction as if to offer her his wishes of luck, but his strange look of near compassion quickly melted away to an impassioned and determined countenance that looked almost like a very foreign emotion that no Mazoku dared speak the name of.  

"Wait…" Niven called softly taking a few hasty steps toward Gaav and reaching out to him, "Please don't go yet…  Stay!  Just a minute, please, Lord Gaav!"  The Dark lord paused with a guttural grunt of annoyance, and sighed deeply, not bothering to turn as he rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest bitterly to answer.  

"Yes, little Niven?  What the hell do you want now?" he snapped caustically, pain crossing his features briefly.  

"I want to know why one of my beloved dark lords is wandering the temple of sand alone!" the girl replied fervently, inching slowly toward the looming, crimson haired apparition, "You must have heard something!  Something about power…  Someone like you must know of something so wonderful hidden away in this temple that would help you regain your lost glory!"

Gaav's brow knitted deeply with a sorrowful frown at the lustful and swaggering words pouring forth ardently from the young Mazoku, and he closed his eyes, clenching his teeth and keeping his back firmly to the woman who bowed submissively behind him in pleading.  

"Heard something yes…" he admitted in a softer voice, eyes flicking to the star studded velvet night sadly, "But I haven't managed to find it again…"  Niven hesitated to answer immediately, confused by Gaav's reverent and mournful words, but quickly pushed it from her mind, grinning wolfishly as she took a cautious step even closer to what she had yearned for.  

"Then allow me to help you find it!  I will swear fealty to you, my Lord Demon Dragon King, you have my undying loyalty!  Please let me assist you!" she proclaimed in a loud and theatric voice, pressing a hand to her chest and reaching one to the sky triumphantly as she finally gained the attention of the pained midnight blue eyes.

They leered menacingly through her body as Gaav turned slowly over his shoulder, but softened when Niven collapsed to the ground in a subservient and pleading bow, her whispered, almost sincere entreaties muffled by the sand.  

"Oh get up…" the demon dragon king hissed dismissively, "I don't want or need help from someone like you."  Niven was up instantly from her submission, clasping her hands together and gasping in horror as she was discharged so quickly, and shook her head violently as she stood.  

"It's nothing like you think!" she assured the dark lord, "I really just want to help you!  Please!  I have never had anyone to ally myself to, and I would love nothing more in the world than to serve you!"

Niven saw opportunity itself retreating before her very eyes, fleeing her desperate reach once again, the skeptical, nearly contemptuous glare in Gaav's eyes penetrating her mind and body as the Claire bible had and dangling her soul's desire just close enough to be seen and yearned for.  It had always eluded her grasp, kept as a mere plaything for a more powerful Mazoku who had been quickly dispatched himself, then forced to carve her figure from a gray palette of stone into the fiery image she had become alone.  She craved what all her kind sought only, to own the universe and its power, for all the world to tremble at the mention of her name, crush those who would dare oppose her, and above all, to fear nothing.

Niven's hopes flared once again as Gaav cocked his head thoughtfully to the side and thought a moment before a wry grin crossed his lips, and a fond sounding chuckle escaped his lips as he opened them to speak.  

"You were threatening my life just a mere few minutes ago!" he replied cheerfully, "And now you bow down at my feet…  I should have known…  You're no different from the rest of us really!  Lusting after power and when it finally slaps you in the face you were too dumb to realize it then throw yourself all over it!"  Gaav's voice grew low and abhorrent as he spoke, reveling in the genuine fear emanating from the cowering but still fiercely determined Mazoku woman, a creature who had known her place in life, and was still trying desperately to break free from it.  She watched his features twist with the same anguish she had seen flash through his eyes, and he closed them briefly, looking away and clearing his throat apologetically as he turned to go for the final time.  

"Then…  Then why are you here?" Niven managed persist firmly, but the voice that spoke the words betrayed the despair she still felt.

The words rang through the empty temple and into the night sky, a knell in the silence and peace it held after eons of turmoil, and Gaav winced as a memory tore through his psyche briefly as a flash of smiling golden eyes, the fleeting feeling of soft, velvety lips against his and locks like woven silk.  The dark lord could almost feel the familiar warmth and tenderness beside him once more, leaving a holy emptiness behind, hear the loving and happy voices that beckoned to him from the distance, always calling and always running with the fiery soul always trailing mockingly close behind.  

"There are more important things to chase than power," Gaav mused sorrowfully at length,  "Things that become a part of you, no matter what you are, and things that should never be let go."  

"Then tell me, please!  If it's not power, if it's not to regain what you once were, if it isn't for your glory than what is it?!" Niven cried hoarsely, terror lacing her countenance.  

"Do you really want to know?" Gaav asked, casting the impetuous young creature beside him a contrite gaze.  

"Yes, tell me please Lord Gaav, what in the world could be more important than having power and being powerful?  What could you possibly want more than restoring your good name after so many centuries of shame and defeat?" she asked bewilderedly, nearly falling to her knees as they weakened with Gaav's flippant retort.  

"Anything," he countered matter-of-factly, wincing at the potently genuine perplexity in the younger Mazoku, "Absolutely anything."

Niven found herself without breath for a moment as her eyes darted about nervously, searching for nothing and seeing the same before rising slowly back to Gaav who was smiling genuinely at her with a kindness she had never seen in one of her own kind.  He sighed fondly and gently lowered himself to the sand, leaning majestically against the cool stone of the manuscript and crossing his arms over his chest, casting an expectant look from under his laconically drooping eyelids at his confused companion and gesturing to the spot across from him broadly.  

"You didn't really expect this to be a short story did you?" he asked raising an eyebrow, and Niven sat obediently, folding her hands across her lap as she leaned toward him anxiously.  

"I heard you had been killed, along with lord Hellmaster…" she began hungrily, her eyes gleaming with curiosity, to which Gaav flinched visibly at the name and nodded grimly before continuing, eyes directed at the vast sky detachedly.  

"That's very true, but good old Phibby, however, was not offered a second chance…" he answered with a smirk, "Because something had happened to me that L-sama herself had found very interesting, I didn't know why she was doing it, but I was sent back to this ever so lovely plane of existence once more, to see if that one little thing she saw, that I had forgotten about myself and forsaken so many times was still true."

Niven's jaw fell open in marvel, and she smiled idolatrously up at the crimson-haired dark lord who still reclined indolently against the tablet looking into the sky with eyes filled with nothing but lonesome want, and raised her body slightly off the sand to edge herself closer to him, eyes glittering with an intrigue that burned within her soul.  

"What happened to you Lord Gaav?" she inquired slyly, "What on earth could happen like that to an infallible dark lord that L-sama herself would send you back here?"  The vision of beauty and bliss passed through Gaav's soul another time, touching him once again as it breezed tantalizingly and fondly by, but he dared not reach out to touch the memory for the knowledge that it still existed far out of his reach as a small, loving smile crossed his lips and his eyes met Niven's for the final time.  

"I fell in love…" whispered Gaav tenderly, "I let my soul be so entwined with another's, the tie was not broken even in death and she sent me back to find it again, or at least, that's what I've come to believe, but…  Fate is not without a fucking sense of cruel irony however…"

Gaav chortled sadly at his own words, his gaze never leaving the younger, very petrified looking gray-eyed Mazoku woman who softened her eager and ravenous looking mien as he spoke, eyes narrowing slightly in disbelief.  

"You…  You what?" Niven sputtered sharply.  

"You heard me right the first time, the great Demon Dragon King Gaav!  The dark Lord who loves blood, war, and destruction the most fell so deeply in love he would give anything in the world to have it back!" Gaav's voice was loud and joyful, but rang emptily and hollow across the dunes encased in the false sky of the temple of sand, "And I was too blind to see it…"  

"What do you mean by that?  I don't understand at all!  Mazoku don't love!  They just can't!  How could you possibly…" Niven interjected frantically, clutching her fists desperately in front of her.  

"You're very young, Niven, and you know very little…" Gaav answered gruffly, "I thought the same way once, all Mazoku do, so don't worry your pretty little head about it!"

Niven wrinkled her nose and bared her fangs slightly at the sarcastically light-hearted and amicably mocking words, and lowered her tense arms dejectedly to her lap.  

"I still don't understand…" she moaned plaintively, "Are you telling me everything I've been taught is wrong?"  

"Yes…" Gaav retorted flatly, "I am actually, and let me tell you why, when I first came back, all I wanted was what you originally thought!  I mean, what better way to really send all the people who had gotten in my way straight to hell?  I began where I had started, with absolutely nothing, no allies, no nothing!  I didn't even get my damn priest or general back!  The uh… Details of my plan are inconsequential really, all you need to know is they brought me once again back to Seyruun, and there, fate intervened and I happened upon an ancient shadow of my past."

Niven listened in absolute rapture, eyes fixed upon Gaav and watching his every move and expression as he spoke, his words falling through the sweet night air as if they belonged there forever.  

"Who was it?" she asked brightly, "An old enemy?  Someone you vowed to kill and never did?  Some woman who still wanted you but had given up for this love of-"  

"My old servant," Gaav answered smugly, "My most loyal and trustworthy companion from my days as an outcast and a traitor.  But, he was different somehow.  Happier…  And still alone.  He was an ancient dragon, the last of his kind, the lucky survivor that I had rescued and made a Mazoku, who was pretty much my right hand man after his race was slaughtered.  I'm assuming you know none of this of course!  Hell, you barely feel old enough to remember my death!"  Niven snarled to herself at the older Mazoku's condescending chortle, and huffed loudly as she crossed her arms impertinently across her chest.  

"I may not have been alive, but I know of the great war!" she snapped in a peevish snarl.  

"Well good for you!" Gaav answered drolly, rolling his eyes as an excuse to look back to the sky and fall silent.  

"Well…?  So?  What happened?  Did he remember you?" Niven asked at length to break the stillness.  

"No…" the dark lord answered solemnly, "No he didn't…  But, I certainly knew him, and he recognized me.  The bastard could still feel our connection even after everything that had happened.  He was always too caring for his own damn good…  I nearly got both of us killed, but I got hurt and he still took me in and protected me, just like I had done for him once when he needed it, and kept me safe, and with this act of kindness on the part of someone who had been cleansed of his sins, thus irony begins an agonizingly slow execution.  We…  We talked a bit, and I sort of managed to piece together what had happened.  The servant I knew had been killed, then reborn, cleansed of his Mazoku side and given a second chance at a decent life.  He told me all too happily about how he had lived in this tiny cottage just outside the town the doubled as a pottery and weapons shop, with his adoptive mother and father, who just so happened to be a Golden dragon, the last of her kind as well, and a Mazoku."

A sharp gasp of horror exited Niven's throat after growing grave and stoic at the mention of her race and she recoiled in disgust, wrapping her hands around her throat as Gaav laughed fondly at her.  

"You mean a Mazoku, was actually _living with a Ryuzoku?  And… And raised a child together?" she wailed plaintively.  _

"You bet your life they did, and not just any Mazoku either, Beastmaster Zelas' right hand man, her priest and general Xellos himself!" retorted the flame-haired Mazoku jovially, raising a finger in the air with a wink reminiscent of the trickster priest.  

"You are not serious…" Niven moaned, shaking her head in disbelief, "Why would he _do that?"  _

"Same reason I'm here," came the pointed answer, "He found something worth more to him than anything, and he had the courage, as much as I hate to say so, to admit it to himself and to Filia, the woman he loved."

Niven fell silent at Gaav's utterly piercing and sincere words as they fell upon her roaring ears, tearing her eyes away from him and forcing herself to look at her own hands, which sat trembling against themselves in her lap.  

"How could he have fallen victim to that?  I've heard terrible stories about him…" she muttered violently.  

"Most of which are true by the way, and of course, not very easily really…" Gaav mused with a smirk, "It took unfathomable amounts of just about everything each of them had, and I actually developed a great deal of respect for that cryptic little ass because of it!  I mean, I didn't manage to realize in time, and he did, and I never knew what that feeling was until after I had lost it…  Lost him…"

Gaav closed his eyes and bowed his head remorsefully as he fell silent, unable to continue for a moment as the familiar old emptiness panged sharply within his breast, a knoll in his body and heart of consequence.  The younger creature watched him intently, the pain registering so blatantly and unabashed on his face completely strange and very foreign to her, and when she met his eyes with mounting curiosity and softness her lips had coiled tenderly into a small smile.  

"Who?  Lost who?" Niven asked in a gentle and wondering tone.  

"The best companion, lover, and friend I ever had, my other half, my soul mate…" Gaav whispered reverently in reply, "That very same blazingly beautiful soul fate had given me once again, my faithful old right hand man…  My Val…"  

"Y-Your…  Your servant?  You were in _l-love with…" the silver-haired woman trailed off, pressing a hand to her chest and looking away nervously.  _

"He was the most beautiful soul that ever lived and suffered!" came the detached, yet oddly cheerful response, "Our bonds were still strong and we could still feel what we once had together, even though both of us were reborn, severed from that life, somehow, across all that we managed to find each other again."  

"So you both still felt something?  If that's true then there shouldn't have been a problem right?  I mean, how can you lose someone that wants to be with you as much as you want to be with them?" Niven asked, her features twisting as her mind did, in the young soul's vain attempts to comprehend what she was being told.

"Because I was stupid, proud, and arrogant…" Gaav hissed vehemently, "And I thought, just as all Mazoku do, that surely the reason I Val and I had been reunited was not at all because we actually shared something deeper than either of us knew, but to stay for the pleasure, that he was my servant and I was entitled to do with him what I pleased, think nothing of the consequences, know deep in my heart that I was darkness, evil, aloof and untouchable.  A shadow to be felt for a split second, desire, then mourn the betrayal of for a lifetime.  But I was never more wrong in my entire existence…  

"He came to me just once…  The night I tried to leave, he ran behind calling my name, reaching out for me, and…  And for some reason I stopped… I caught him in my embrace, felt his familiar warmth in my arms once more, and in the dark moonlight together again we remembered.  We remembered our wild, untamed past as outcasts despised and hurt by the world, looked into each other's eyes just for once like we knew and still loved each other…  We surrendered ourselves to it in that one night, all those memories and feelings, rekindling them all in a single kiss by moonlight, but with that kiss, we both sealed our fate."

Gaav stopped for a moment and chuckled nostalgically to himself, his hands flexing idly upon his thighs as he gazed wistfully into the glittering, moonless infinity of stars above them, winking and flashing brightly to each other from their immeasurable separation.  

"The sky looked just like this that night…" he breathed passionately, almost feeling the tender and fervent touch of his love upon his body once more, "I can still hear his voice like he were right beside me…  Asking me to stay with him, pleading with me not to leave him again, and I held him close and ignored absolutely everything in the world.  I remember everything about that night, to the last detail, everything about his body and mine, and can still feel him in my arms as we made love, his gentle touch on my skin, his soft lips on mine, and the warmth inside of him, forgetting that anything else existed but us and the bed we shared.  I had never felt more alive and whole in my life, never closer or happier with another being, and for one blissful moment, our bodies and souls were one entity to the entire world…"

The words struck in perfect harmony with Niven's wavering heart, and the Mazoku woman sat stranded and alone in the desert despite the warm and tortured presence beside her, shaking her head unconsciously to herself as she listened to Gaav's tale.  

"He gave himself to you…" she whispered reverently, "Because… He wanted to?  And what happened the next morning?  Was he ashamed?  Or did he want you to… To go or…"  

"I wish I knew…" interpolated Gaav ruefully, "Gods be damned I wish I knew…  Because like the coward all fucking Mazoku are, I ran with my damn tail between my legs…  I left before Val even woke up, left him obliviously asleep where he had been in my arms, that tiny grin that looked so much like the man I had known still across his face as I kissed him one last time and ran away."  

"So then what happened?  Did he come for you?  Did you go back?" Niven interjected swiftly, clasping her hands eagerly and leaning further in toward Gaav.  

"I thought nothing of it at the time, and I tried to go back to what I had been trying so desperately to win.  I killed, and I destroyed, and I fought to regain my name, but oddly never again with the determination I once had.  I spent countless nights screaming at myself for being so stupid, for wanting Val so badly, and reminding myself that I could never have him like I once had.  He was no longer my servant, he was not bound to me, and as much as I tried to tell myself I could just fucking take him and be done with it all, I knew I could never do that to him. I tried to lose myself in my conquests, eke my way back to the top which was an insurmountable task as it was, but nothing really worked.  My wait wasn't long, however, and everything came to a screeching halt the day I saw the Golden Dragon.  

"Filia had found me and come, unarmed, in human form no less, and I thought to myself, 'What a chance!  Kill the last Golden, be rid of her filthy species forever and _completely_ sever myself from Val and end all this!'  But the look in her eyes stayed my hand as she reached out to me, fumbled for the words and finally looked me right in the eyes defiantly as she spoke.  I can still hear her…  There isn't a day that goes by I don't…  'Val's sick…' she whispered, and it took an eternity for me to fully understand what she meant as she explained.  Val was more than just sick, he was deathly ill, and it had started just a few days after we slept together.  No one had been able to do anything for him, Xellos and Filia had called in people from all over the world to look at their beloved son, to try anything, do anything, but nothing helped.  So I laughed at her, told her to take her pitiful family problems to someone who cared as my soul itself shattered painlessly, and she just looked at me silently, as if she knew everything that had happened, like she was…  Disappointed in me, bid me farewell, and left without another word…" Gaav's voice had become more distant as he slipped further into his memories of the past, and he spoke as if her were reliving every moment, the fire within flaring and dimming with the mention of his tragic fall from the closest to grace he could be.

"So that was it then?  What's the issue?  Val was out of your life and you could go on!  I knew you were looking for something to clear your name!  I just knew it Lord Gaav!" Niven gushed happily, finally looking relieved and very much like herself.  

"For the last time, no!  Have you heard a word I've said you impossible little moron?" Gaav seethed, "I came here for Val!  For the man I love!  Because when I finally realized what was happening to us it was too damn late!"  Gaav looked away after his outburst, clenching his fists furiously and gritting his jaw as the shocked and terrified Niven shrunk away from him in horror.  

"I-I finally decided to go back and see him…  Just to prove to myself he wasn't going to stand in my way anymore, or so I thought…  I wasn't exactly welcome either, Xellos particularly was rather displeased by my presence, but Filia seemed strangely glad to see me.  She led me immediately to the back of their small home, to a darkened bedroom where meager light filtered through the curtains and fell across the pale face of a pale, shivering figure in bed, illuminating his tangled matted, familiar teal hair.  'Surely, this can't be Val…' I thought as I took the stool at his beside, 'This isn't the beautiful man I made love to, it isn't!'  But…  As much as I denied what I was seeing, the ravaged body that lay dying in that bed was him.  I don't know if Filia left at that point, all I remember was feeling Xellos' eyes burn into me from the door, hating me and mocking me for being so blind and stupid as I took Val's hand, caressed his fevered forehead gently and called his name.

"His eyes opened so slowly, searched the darkness sadly for only a moment as if expecting nothing to be there, then his numb body seemed to sense me beside him, and he turned his head.  When he saw me, his entire being seemed to lift, and he looked for a moment as if he didn't believe it, and reached up to touch my face.  'Am I dreaming again, or did you really come back?' he breathed.  His voice sounded so small, so ill, and so empty, still uncertain of what he was seeing.  'Of course I came back…  I'm really here, Val…' I assured him, taking his hand in mine and kissing the back of it gently.  He smiled, his beautiful golden eyes glittering wistfully with the life that was slowly leaving them.  'I'm glad, I just wish it could have lasted…' he told me.  I told him not to talk, that he'd be just fine, that I was there for him, you know, all the things you think to say to someone who everyone knows is dying except for you…  I think now I was just trying to cover up the guilt….

"I stayed with Val for the rest of that night, lay in bed with him and held him tightly, trying so hard to warm his icy, trembling body as if I could somehow still save him, but… It really was too late.  He stopped shivering, and opened his eyes one last time, which were strangely lucid as he looked lovingly into mine, and I will never forget what he told me.  'I forgive you' he said, barely able to speak with what little breath he had left, 'And I know why you left…  But I want you to know something, before it's too late…'  I reassured him once again, told him not to talk like that, but he just smiled at me, and wrapped his arms around me as best he could as he whispered his last words.  'It is not admitting to weakness, Gaav, to admit your own feelings, it is acknowledging strength, a strength that mere courageous few of your kind have.  It's like a night's embrace, dark, and powerful…   But letting the stars shine like the light they are, existing as one…  Night falls, sun rises, you never let anything stop you…  Don't ever start…  We've spent eternity chasing each other and missing it by one step, and I don't ever plan on stopping….  I will run for a second to catch up to you…  This time, wait for me, Gaav, my night…  I love you…'

"I was speechless…  He loved me…  He loved me and I abandoned him, only to come back at the last minute.  Always too late…  I could only hold him as he kissed me passionately, running a hand through my hair and across my cheek, then let it fall limply to the bed.  I called his name as his eyes slowly slid shut, and his chest ceased to rise beneath my touch.  I begged him, I pleaded, I asked every god in existence… 'Oh gods, don't take him from me…  Please don't let him go…  Please don't die Val…  Stay with me…  I love you too…'  But no one heard…  No one…

"No one heard, nothing answered, and Val died quietly in my arms…  He was gone…  I had forsaken the one thing that could have saved my soul, and lost it forever!  It was like nothing I had ever felt, and for the first and last time in my life, I cried…  I clutched his cold, lifeless body to mine until the pale, gray light of the morning filled the room dimly and cried until I couldn't anymore.  Xellos and Filia didn't even bother coming in that morning…  I think they knew in their hearts what had happened and I'm eternally grateful to them for letting me have the last moments with him.  I buried my love just a few days later on a beautiful hill outside the city overlooking it all, laid the other half of my soul to rest beneath a stone carved with his name and an old saying in the ancient Ryuzoku language I couldn't read, and that was all.  The end of everything…"

The horizon glowed a pale blue as Gaav fell silent again, illuminating his somber face and blazing eyes as a soft breeze tossed his flaming red hair gently across his cheeks, as if an unseen hand had caressed them lovingly.  The genuine love and sorrow emanating from him seeped into Niven's being, and she felt a hot searing down her cheek which she wiped away furiously, only to find the tear glittering softly at her in the dim light.  

"So that was it then…" she whispered reverently, "You suffered for your love and lost it too…  Why, Lord Gaav?  Why?"  The dark Lord sighed and pressed his hands close together, looking down into the blue hued sand as if it pained him physically to speak any longer.  

"Niven…  I didn't suffer for nothing…  I love Val, and I am _never going to just accept his death and a life without him, and when I told that to Xellos and Filia, they agreed.  We spent two years searching this temple for a spell that could bring him back, but as you can see, we haven't found anything yet.  I've been searching five, three years after Xellos and Filia made the decision to go back to life…  Filia eventually decided that it was an impossible task, and that she'd rather cope with Val's death than live with the pain that was freshened by what she deemed a false hope we could bring him back, and Xellos went with her, though I can still feel him in this temple occasionally, still searching with me, still comforting his beloved dragon and mourning the loss of not only her child, but his as well.  Xellos loved Val like a son, and his dedication is just as strong as Filia's and mine.  It took me so long to understand what Val meant in his dying breath, but I finally do._

"I lost Val, just like Val lost me, we have lived our same existence over again because neither of us could see how much we need each other.  I told you fate has a cruel sense of irony, those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it, and so I have.  I was always so arrogant and aloof, but I have finally come to know what that strange feeling is that caused this whole ordeal.  When I looked into Val's eyes, when I tasted his lips on mine, when our bodies were as one in love, even when he brushed my arm walking past with a piece of pottery, cast a fond smile across the room at me, like we had always been lovers, I was happy…  I loved him always as I do now, but I didn't know it.  Love and happiness we think are revolting, but we can feel them ourselves, and no one will admit they do because it looks weak, doesn't it?"

Niven nodded gravely, avoiding Gaav's gaze and wrapping her arms protectively about her body as she felt the first ray's of the morning's warmth across the desert seep into her back and crawl delicately over the imposing form of the Demon Dragon King.  

"Val was right…  We think we can't love, we seek power and domination, and we think so blindly this will make our lives complete, but what we really want is just to be happy.  It's what every creature in this world wants.  We lie, cheat, wound, and steal from everyone, why should our own selves be exempt?  I thought being on top and feared again would make me happy, but it never did and it never will, being with Val is all I'll ever need, and I'm proud that I can admit this to him, even if he isn't with me now, and you too.  So go home Niven, wherever that is, think for yourself and ignore everything else.  You are the master of your own soul, and you can just as easily destroy it as fulfill it," He explained, leaning forward and cupping the younger Mazoku's chin in his hand and forcing her to look at him.

"I-I don't think I-" she began, but was swiftly interrupted.  "No!  Don't do that, don't think, just exist," Gaav interjected tenderly, casting a warm and wry smile downward at the girl as the sun climbed higher in the sky.  

"Just exist…" Niven repeated blankly, looking up confusedly back into his eyes, "I-I don't understand anything you've told me tonight, Lord Gaav…"  

"It's alright, you're young yet, you don't really need to, you'll figure it out for yourself, now, I really should get going, I'm afraid I may have lost my spot!" Gaav laughed brightly as he stood, dusting off his coat and cupping a hand over his eyes as he searched the yellowed palace bathed in golden light, "You'd best get going too, I think I was headed this way, right?"

Niven nodded dumbly as Gaav pointed in the direction he had originally been walking, and adjusted the long blade strapped to his back as he turned to go, casting one last glance over his shoulder at the distraught young woman.  

"Niven…  Just remember what I said, it's all you need to know," he breathed fervently, and began along the short distance to the next row of tablets.

The flame-haired man scanned quickly over it, finding nothing of interest, and paused a moment before moving on, listening to the wail of energy and the frustrated shriek of anger as Niven teleported from the temple and he grinned puckishly to himself as he looked longingly into the sky.  

"Well Val, think she heard me?" he asked with a smirk, "Don't worry love, I'm coming for you, I promise, just hold on…  I love you…"

The sun wheeled soullessly above in the pale blue sky once again, lighting Gaav's path along the blistering golden sands through the knowledge of the ages that meant nothing to him, except for a mere two tablets lost somewhere in the infinite labyrinth of stones.  One, unfound and awaiting, that would bring his love back to him from the realm of death and from the jaws of fate itself, and the other, a small monolith tucked away amidst the others, that told him why he would hold his beloved in his arms once more; he could hope.

Niven ran from the temple of sand fearing it as nothing before in her life, ran from the words of one of her own kind, speaking of blasphemy and untrue sentiment that she had always known to ignore, and suddenly never wanted to again.  She thought surely story had been fabricated, everything created by Gaav to sway her, for she would disbelieve, and come back to him begging to be shown the way, but vowed not to give him the satisfaction.  She went insolently to the small white cottage just outside of Seyruun that doubled as a pottery shop, found the tall grassy knoll that overlooked the city, and climbed it defiantly one evening at sunset, blood red light spilling over her eyes and the world.  She found, at the end of her ascent however, nothing but a small stone plaque that read, "Love Transcends All, by a Night's Embrace," and no sign that there had ever been a grave, or a tombstone.  She snarled to herself, cursed the Demon Dragon King and turned violently to go, until the sound of laughter drew her blazing eyes away from the inscription, and she looked down the other side of the hill.

At the bottom, beneath a small canopy of a few trees that skirted the city and the tiny homes and shops scattered around the metropolis of white magic, were two figures, both bathed in light as they sat against the trunk.  Flames of red hair blew lazily across the breeze, cooled by a shimmering teal against them, and midnight blue eyes glanced only for a moment at the familiar figure framed in light and cast in darkness perched so distantly upon a hill.  They returned quickly at the soft inquiry of the golden-eyed man held protectively and lovingly in his arms who reached up and caressed his cheeks, laughing at him as he shook his head, responding that it was nothing, and kissed him passionately.

It was a specter of the past, an icon of truth amid all the lies Niven knew her beloved Lord Gaav had told her, it was his Val, the beloved Ancient Dragon whom fate had stolen from him, then given back.  The Dark Lord who had looked so weak and stupid in her eyes emerged victorious as always, and the happiness she felt from both the souls, joined forever by bonds and omnipotent powers of love and devotion that had endured more than either could imagine was overwhelming.

Niven watched them sadly as they sat together, basking in the sunset and their love, holding one another close, and shut her eyes against the warm light as she phased out of their existence.  The words would always haunt the young Mazoku, and though she believed she would never make sense of them, in the end, one of her Lords was gone and he had won, for she never forgot the beautiful teal haired young man he held so tightly to his chest, nor the words inscribed in stone upon a hill bathed in light.

"Love Transcends All, by a Night's Embrace."


End file.
